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Are there ballets that should no longer be staged?


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22 minutes ago, pherank said:

Indeed. It's relatively simple to alter visual elements, but if we are talking about themes of a ballet, which may be baked into the choreography, then we have what we have. In the case of Petrouchka, there is a great deal of emotional and physical violence which is objectionable to many people (though it would fit right in with prime-time American TV). Removing the physical violence from the choreography would necessitate a complete 're-visioning' of the ballet. And it wouldn't be Fokine anymore. Interestingly, Fokine was essentially following Stravinsky's lead since the composer envisioned a puppet come to life and the reaction to this aberration was 'violence' in the music itself.

At least the violence in Petrouchka isn't gratuitous, trivial, or pornographic--nor, like most prime time tv violence, designed to be casual entertainment.   I know there are people who personally refuse to watch any representations of violence in any media--I've been with them when they walked out of movies--but that's a personal matter. 

Petrouchka even thematizes the tension between "real" violence and violence in works of art when the crowds are horrified at Petrouchka's death and then reassured he is just a puppet...etc.  In other words, it's a serious treatment of painful subject matter... which most certainly belongs to the bailliwick of art including ballet.

But, one way or another, I do think the Fokine/Benois/Stravinsky is a tightly constructed creation--it's hard to pull at one of its threads without the whole thing unraveling.  I am not sure that is true of more episodically constructed Nineteenth-Century spectacles such as Corsaire.

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5 minutes ago, Drew said:

At least the violence in Petrouchka isn't gratuitous, trivial, or pornographic--nor, like most prime time tv violence, designed to be casual entertainment.

Interestingly, when I just did a search on Petrouchka the Wikipedia entry (naturally at the top of the search list) describes it as a "ballet burlesque" which sort of contradicts what you've just written. Just shows you that different people see different things when looking at the same subject. I personally don't see Petrouchka as mere burlesque - it's more of an existential tragedy to me, with references to freewill vs predetermined fate and such things.

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Excising the violence in Petroushka would totally changed the very core narrative of the ballet.  Ha...I can almost see the Russians saying.."and then you westerners dare to criticize our Soviet revisionists and their new SL ending...!" 

Attitudes toward certain art form narratives might change with the times, but if works of art are being chopped off, tunics to Greek classical sculptures are placed or countless paintings-(in which, like the "Olympia", the black character is relegated to a maid in the background)- taken away from museums, then then end is near. And it is VERY easy to get viewers used to alterations and changes. 

For God's sake...the Russians themselves have been watching the wrong ending of Swan Lake for more than half a century now!

 

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Very nice of you to summarize things, Quinten. That's much too ambitious for me to try.  ;)

Your mention of the phrase "ballets aren't Shakespeare" along with the Balanchine mention actually relates to a writer's suggestion that Balanchine masterworks (not necessarily all of the ballets) ARE like Shakespeare in that they are marvelously cohesive and even a bad rendering is still Balanchine/Shakespeare. The important distinction I would make between what Balanchine is doing with The Four Temperaments or Stravinsky Violin Concerto, and a 'war horse' story ballet is that for The 4 T's the choreography is everything. There are no revisions allowed - changing the steps, changing the dance creates a new work, but it's no longer the Balanchine ballet as conceived of by Mr. B. All possible themes are 'baked' into the choreography. But the romantic era story ballets are frequently versioned to varying degrees of success. Every choreographer with ambition seems to want to take a crack at Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty, etc.

"Let the audience decide whether they like it or not"
For myself, I agree that I would rather ballet companies not insult the intelligence of the audience (deserving or not) and try to anticipate 'issues' by imposing changes on a ballet beforehand. I like the idea of dealing with controversies at the pre-performance seminar/Q&A session that most companies hold.

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1 hour ago, pherank said:

Your mention of the phrase "ballets aren't Shakespeare" along with the Balanchine mention actually relates to a writer's suggestion that Balanchine masterworks (not necessarily all of the ballets) ARE like Shakespeare in that they are marvelously cohesive and even a bad rendering is still Balanchine/Shakespeare.

They're also like Shakespeare because there were periods where the plays were chopped up, speeches from other sources were interpolated, the endings were changed for the sensibility of the times, etc.  They haven't always been sacred text.

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2 hours ago, Quinten said:

.    But when it comes to making Shylock not look like a Jew we have a problem because it goes to fundamental questions addressed by Shakespeare to all our benefit (although perhaps some on this thread might say the Merchant of Venice should not be staged).  
 

I agree that Shylock has to be a "Jew" in Shakespeare's play--well, I should have thought that's not up for debate..though what Shakespeare's audience thought "look[ed] like a Jew"--and what they tolerated in the way of such images--and what another generation thinks and tolerates might be up for debate among directors, designers, and audiences.  And I do not advocate not staging the play, though it is far from my favorite. I also agree that Shylock's being a Jew goes to fundamental questions addressed by Shakespeare's play and--rather crucially-- the way it poses them. (And the way it poses questions can't he separated from the questions themselves. As you say, it matters that Shylock is a Jew.)

However, whether those questions in the way the way the play poses them are "to all our benefit"...that on the other hand...seems to me a much more problematic statement. The internet is a tricky thing and perhaps I have not understood you correctly...

(On the subject of forgiveness I much prefer Measure for Measure.)

Edited by Drew
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3 hours ago, pherank said:

"Let the audience decide whether they like it or not"
For myself, I agree that I would rather ballet companies not insult the intelligence of the audience (deserving or not) and try to anticipate 'issues' by imposing changes on a ballet beforehand. 

Or to put it another way – ballet companies may realize that there are things in work X that are embarrassingly offensive and which they would rather not present regardless of whether their audience is particularly alert to the offense, and try to acknowledge and address those problems. 

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Actually not too many people go to the pre-performance seminars in San Francisco, maybe 200 to the Green Room against a week's run in an opera house of 2,500 or so seats. Program notes would be better – and ones which outline the problems up front – by the second paragraph – and clearly.

For instance with "The Cage," just as it's often noted that Prokofiev didn't like Balanchine's choreography for "Prodigal Son," here it could be said that Stravinsky didn't care for Robbin's choreography, and when he gave City Ballet permission to use the score, he thought Balanchine was the choreographer (which is sort of amusing). You would also have to gently fill in the early 50's post war atmosphere of low grade misogeny and all the paranoia regarding the red scare. (Michael Baxandall's "Pattern's of Intentions" might serve as a good template.)

With "Bugaku," you could note that the choreography was controversial from the beginning, not just now, and that Arlene Croce, Jack Anderson, B F Haggin and Robert Garis had to work around its problematic asian overlay in order to defend it (Allen Hughes at the Times decidedly didn't). Croce: "though there are moments of satire in the geisha-girl pantomime (as well as some nasty pseudo-Oriental mannerisms), 'Bugaku' is the nearest thing in the New York City Ballet repertory to a Bejart ballet."

And Nancy Goldner has quite a discussion on "the sexual violence" in the ballet in her "Balanchine Variations". "What ensues is rape, but not the conventional kind. In "Bugaku," the woman is a complicit party to the mating, because, as [Allegra] Kent says, it is ordained, and they both emerge from it as inscrutable as they are for the entire ballet."

*

When I was in high school, the first year English Shakespeare play that was assigned was "Merchant of Venice" (third year was "Julius Caesar"). What a thing to throw to ninth graders – in a small San Joaquin Valley farm town – to try to figure out! (though I do think, like Drew, that it's ok to occasionally perform.) My parents were rather enlightened as far as social injustices were concerned, and over the years I felt I have been too. Except... Except I've recently realized it hasn't been enough. These corrections for horrible things – like removal of statues of Justice Taney who wrote the Dred Scott decision from state house property or Justin Herman's name from a plaza in SF – are coming way too late. What excuses have we made to ourselves over the years, how we've sequestered the sting of these terrible symbols from ourselves, saying these little things really don't matter, just look the other way, etc. You'll just upset everyone if you make a fuss. 

I think the key might be when we say "some people might be offended." It might go deeper and be broader than that.

Edited by Quiggin
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11 hours ago, dirac said:

Or to put it another way – ballet companies may realize that there are things in work X that are embarrassingly offensive and which they would rather not present regardless of whether their audience is particularly alert to the offense, and try to acknowledge and address those problems. 

I strongly believe that's the case with ABT's Raymonda, even if some others believe that the ballet got dropped due to being a poor production.

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11 hours ago, Quiggin said:

For instance with "The Cage," just as it's often noted that Prokofiev didn't like Balanchine's choreography for "Prodigal Son," here it could be said that Stravinsky didn't care for Robbin's choreography, and when he gave City Ballet permission to use the score, he thought Balanchine was the choreographer (which is sort of amusing).

There is also that story - someone here will no doubt remember where it's told and by whom - of Balanchine watching the ballet with someone and remarking - or maybe the other person remarked - on the beauty of the score and then saying something like "But look what he [Robbins] did with it."

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On 1/15/2018 at 11:50 PM, Quiggin said:

Actually not too many people go to the pre-performance seminars in San Francisco, maybe 200 to the Green Room against a week's run in an opera house of 2,500 or so seats. Program notes would be better – and ones which outline the problems up front – by the second paragraph – and clearly.

...

And Nancy Goldner has quite a discussion on "the sexual violence" in the ballet in her "Balanchine Variations". "What ensues is rape, but not the conventional kind. In "Bugaku," the woman is a complicit party to the mating, because, as [Allegra] Kent says, it is ordained, and they both emerge from it as inscrutable as they are for the entire ballet."

 

Adding a 'disclaimer', shall we say, to program notes is a very one-sided approach. I agree that the program notes should talk about any issues with the ballet, but special talks and pre-performance seminars allow for conversation between company/performers and audience. And that can be used to actually promote interest in ballets as art work to be experienced and discussed. I think it's great that SFB is increasing the number of their special seminars, classes and talks. I don't think they can be accused of not making an effort. The trick is in reaching audiences that normally wouldn't even consider ballet as an option.

I never understood Goldner's statement, "What ensues is rape, but not the conventional kind", or her reference to Bugaku's "expression of sexual violence". What exactly is the nature of this 'unconventional rape'? Goldner is relying upon a definition that the rest of us are not privy too, so I just have to shake my head and move on. I can re-watch Bugaku over and again, but I just don't see a rape being depicted. And we are not talking about a "shotgun" wedding either. The only real 'violence' that I see is the sometimes incredibly awkward partnering movements ("none of it looks easy; much of it looks grotesque"). If only dancers had as much time rehearsing Bugaku as Agon, we might witness a very different atmosphere to the performance.

EDIT: Here's an interesting question - who dances Bugaku particularly well? And how do you decide their interpretation is exemplary, or for that matter, unconvincing?

 

NYCB just posted some images of the original Four Temperaments costumes (Kurt Seligmann) - I bet few people (non-balletomanes) could guess the ballet being depicted if they saw only the photos with no captions.  ;)

https://www.instagram.com/p/BeGrDafAH9j/?hl=en&taken-by=nycballet

https://www.instagram.com/p/BeGq7xHgqFu/?hl=en&taken-by=nycballet

 

 

Edited by pherank
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3 hours ago, pherank said:

I never understood Goldner's statement, "What ensues is rape, but not the conventional kind", or her reference to Bugaku's "expression of sexual violence". What exactly is the nature of this 'unconventional rape'? Goldner is relying upon a definition that the rest of us are not privy too, so I just have to shake my head and move on.

Her comments have always felt a bit Orientalist to me -- we can't understand the "other."  That may not have been her intention, but it read that way to me at the time, and it feels even more so today.

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pherank:

Quote

Adding a 'disclaimer', shall we say, to program notes is a very one-sided approach.

I always like book reviews and art history notes where the reviewer follows the trajectory of a work, how it was initially accepted, its controversies, and how we see it now. This is often done in a scholarly and entertaining way in the NY Times, and the New York and London Reviews. What's often the case is that there are reviewers who "get" the work early on and clearly. For instance there was a very understanding review of Robert Frank's "Americans" done in the New York Times when the book first came out but which everyone forgot about afterwards, so there was subsequently the myth that it was universally panned. And Kevin Thomas wrote a very appreciative review of one of Truffaut's most underated movies, "The Soft Skin," in the Los Angeles Times when it was first released. The "stations" a work of art passes through, its endless lives, are always fascinating.

Program notes could devote a paragraph to a kind of "historical intent" of the work without boring anyone too much. I agree that SF Ballet has done many excellent "Pointes of Views" pre-ballet programs. However, the ones I've sat in over the past ten years have only taken in a tiny fraction of the audience members who would see the ballets during the 10 day run, and the q&a s have been limited in number and in scope.

Regarding Nancy Goldner's interpretation of "Bugaku,", which she develops in much greater detail than what I quoted above, there are earlier reviews that also signal that this is tricky territory. Jack Anderson says,

Quote

Alone at last, bride and groom dance a highly erotic pas de deux that is also a battle of wills. No longer demure, the bride is someone with whom the groom must contend.

Clive Barnes:

Quote

Mr. Schaufuss was feral, there was a suppressed violence to his movements, a coarseness to his interpretation that almost denied the role's conception. Edward Villella played it was a menacing gentleness, and that seemed right. Mr. Schaufuss dances it with a gentle menace, and that seems subtly wrong. The ballet is not meant to be a rape but a marriage.

I thought Robert Garis's take was amusing in that he almost puts a Hollywood ending to it:

Quote

Balanchine had never before invented anything as perilously close to the unacceptable as turning Kent’s extended leg into a phallus. But this erotic adventure was produced with his familiar tact and taste … And to cap it off their [Kent and Villella’s] dance identity gave a witty American normalcy to this work of extreme artifice.

 

Edited by Quiggin
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This is a fascinating discussion. :) I have not as much experience as most of you, but nevertheless....Just a thought: Here in Germany and Austria when Shakespeare plays are presented they are done so of course in German, and there often are chnages to the text, perhaps in part because it has already been translated, so one can presumably continue to translate further, or for clarity or other  reasons.(of course it is the same with any other plays which were originally written in a language other than German; they are all translated, as are all films dubbed)

I guess that is often done with choreographies, too, though perhaps not those which are so well protected that the permission to stage them is attached to the promise to do so faithfully. I wonder if the "translation" of text and the inevitable changes - however subtle - that brings with it, could (or does) have a parallel in choreographies. I would think it surely does; though perhaps not quite as strongly in the purely classical ballets as in more modern pieces. 

I agree that it seems  a huge issue is to  figure out what is important, what is the essence, of a work, and how to preserve that while also allowing it  to exist within the times and the culture at present; especially if the companies/ performers  are financiallly dependent on audiences coming and paying. 

One reason some European countries so lavishly support the arts is so  the artists are not forced to follow current ideas of what is "good" or "worthy". Of course, there is constant debate about what is good or worthy or what is "art", but that is indeed another subject. 

-d-

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In Britain political correctness is not as prevalent as in the US, it exists strongly in some political circles but in general the concept is viewed with scepticism by the public as a whole.  In the arts it is embraced in the theatre (no white actor may now play Othello), but not in the other performing arts where white tenors continue to sing Verdi's Otello.  In fact the opera and particularly the RO go further and further with unwarranted scenes of sex and female nudity.  The current Rigoletto opens with a scene of such extreme sexual violence and nudity I had to look away, yes the opening is described in the text as an orgy but in decades of performance this has been shown without the need to cast the audience as voyeurs.  In the online programme notes there is a warning of the graphic content but I feel sorry for those parents introducing their kids to one of the most tuneful operas in existence to find them faced with X rated content, it must have been excruciatingly embarrassing for them.

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2 hours ago, Mashinka said:

The current Rigoletto opens with a scene of such extreme sexual violence and nudity

Dear Mashinka have you forgotten about the Michieletto "William Tell" production in summer of 2015 ? We received an email alert from the ROH regarding the rather explicit rape enactment at the opening scene a couple of days before we were due to fly over to see it. However I must confess I saw nothing that would shock me ...... but then I belong to a different culture !  :D:D (Signed : Seyd Pasha !)

Edited by mnacenani
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Who could forget it?  Never ever heard so much booing in my life, though I think most of the anger was aimed against the inappropriate use of Rossini's famous ballet music.  It also came after a series of rubbish RO productions.

In defence of the Brits, they are not as prudish as some imagine, I remember a production of Purcell's Fairy Queen at Glyndebourne and repeated at an Albert Hall Prom, where the stage was invaded by a hoard of the cutest Easter bunnies ever seen that began by dancing and then started doing what rabbits do best in every permutation of the Kama Sutra.  The audience was hysterical with laughter.  What offends is violence towards women, particularly graphic in the Rigoletto I saw earlier this week.

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Quote

In the arts it is embraced in the theatre (no white actor may now play Othello), but not in the other performing arts where white tenors continue to sing Verdi's Otello.

Well, it’s hard enough to find a tenor of any hue who can sing a decent Otello, so the opera houses can’t afford to be too choosy.

For centuries Othello was the only major Shakespearean role black actors who essayed the classics could play. (Sidney Poitier once turned down an offer to play Othello for television because it was the designated deserving-black-guy role.) It’s my hope that one day things will loosen up a bit and white actors and singers will be able to don black body makeup to play the role without echoes of Amos ‘n’ Andy, because Othello/Otello really does have to be dark – you need that visual contrast, you need to see him surrounded by whites.

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5 hours ago, dirac said:

Well, it’s hard enough to find a tenor of any hue who can sing a decent Otello, so the opera houses can’t afford to be too choosy.

For centuries Othello was the only major Shakespearean role black actors who essayed the classics could play. (Sidney Poitier once turned down an offer to play Othello for television because it was the designated deserving-black-guy role.) It’s my hope that one day things will loosen up a bit and white actors and singers will be able to don black body makeup to play the role without echoes of Amos ‘n’ Andy, because Othello/Otello really does have to be dark – you need that visual contrast, you need to see him surrounded by whites.

This reminds me that Orson Welles played Othello in one of his great, essentially homemade, personal film projects (earning the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1952). He wore makeup to look more 'swarthy'.

othello1.jpg

Edited by pherank
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On 19/01/2018 at 3:10 PM, mnacenani said:

Dear Mashinka have you forgotten about the Michieletto "William Tell" production in summer of 2015 ? We received an email alert from the ROH regarding the rather explicit rape enactment at the opening scene a couple of days before we were due to fly over to see it. However I must confess I saw nothing that would shock me ...... but then I belong to a different culture !  :D:D (Signed : Seyd Pasha !)

It was substantially toned down after the first night as a result of the initial reaction.

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